Fifty years of undergraduate public health education: Lessons learned and future directions

East Tennessee State University (ETSU) has provided public health education at the undergraduate level for over fifty years. The BS Community Health began in 1955, and the BS Environmental Health, (the nation's oldest EHAC-accredited undergraduate degree program) in 1964. The Department of Health Sciences (microbiology) was added in 1965. Unlike most Colleges of Public Health, ETSU began by offering undergraduate training and then subsequently added graduate programs—an MS environmental health (1969), an MPH (1986) and several doctoral programs (2006 and 2007). ETSU offers BS Environmental Health sciences, BS Health Sciences (microbiology and human health), and BS Public Health (community health, and health care administration). In the past ten years about 700 undergraduate degrees have been awarded, and the College of Public Health continues to have almost twice as many undergraduate as graduate students. Approximately 30% of students accept full-time employment with their required practicum site. While preparation for further academic study is important, the two BSPH concentrations were included in the recent accreditation as “professional” degrees, reflecting the reality that the majority of graduates enter the workforce. This is a reflection both of hiring practices in central Appalachia, and of the background of many students (44% of recent MPH graduates were the first in their family to graduate from College). Based on feedback from alumni, local employers, and advisory committees, the faculty is undertaking a comprehensive revision of the undergraduate curriculum, and exploring innovative approaches to meet the needs of working professionals who lack college-level training in public health.